Vital Lightning
by ellijay
Summary: After "Journey's End" the Doctor goes to Cardiff for a refueling stop, but a collision forces him to track down a potentially harmful alien. Jack and Martha join him in what should be an easy retrieval, but the harm turns out to be more than potential.
1. Holding on

"Vital Lightning" by ellijay

Summary: After "Journey's End" the Doctor goes to Cardiff for a simple refueling stop, but an unexpected collision forces him to track down a potentially harmful alien. Jack and Martha join him in what should be an easy retrieval, but the harm turns out to be more than potential.

Author's Notes: A huge thank-you to readerjane for a wonderful job of beta-reading, and additional thanks to aranhe and alipeeps for helping to put the finishing touches on the story.

* * *

Chapter 1 – "Holding on…"

It had been a long time since the Doctor had experienced something that felt so much like the passing of an era, only this time it had ended before it had even truly begun. Only a short while ago, the TARDIS had been full of light and laughter, a full crew piloting her as she was meant to be flown, all of them full of elation, the joy of being alive, of having survived, of having saved so very many other lives.

Now he stood alone, motionless at the control console of the TARDIS, cold and dripping wet in the silence. The loss was profound, the emptiness overwhelming. He was numb, head to foot, heart to mind to soul. He didn't move, tried not to think, until his shirt and hair were long since dried.

_The Doctor's soul is revealed. See him! See the heart of him!_

The sudden memory made him jerk upright and push away from the control console. He could recall perfectly the exact tone of Dalek Caan's voice and felt once again the horrid chill the words had sent through him.

_The man who keeps running, never looking back, because he dare not, out of shame._

He started to pace rapidly back and forth, his hands shoved into his hair and clenching into fists. It was in his nature to move, restless, never stopping. Shame had nothing to do with it. Pain, perhaps, and regret. Not the same at all. He'd never done anything but what needed doing. He had to believe that.

He forced himself to stand still, sucked in a deep breath, pushed stiffly dried hair back over his head. Then he scrubbed his hands over his face and angrily flipped a few switches on the control console. He wanted to run now, needed so badly to run, from what had happened on the Crucible and even more so from what he'd had to do since.

But he couldn't allow himself that release just yet. He still had to finish what he'd started. He had to tell Sarah Jane, Martha and Jack what had happened to – been done to – Donna. They were part of the equation of keeping her alive, and if they weren't warned, they might find out she was back on Earth and apparently suffering from some kind of partial amnesia. They might go digging for answers as to what had happened to her and unknowingly trigger a fatal reaction.

No use waiting, even though he could send the message to the right time from anywhere along his future personal timeline. He needed to get it over and done with now. His stomach turned at the thought of delivering the message to anyone in person, the recrimination he would inevitably face. So he'd be a coward and opt for the twenty-first century's best option for communicating without having to look someone in the eyes or even speak to them with a voice that couldn't be trusted to hold steady: he'd send an e-mail. Yes, it was a cold and impersonal way to do it, but it was the only way he thought he could manage it.

He walked around to the monitor but wasn't quite sure how to begin. The more he thought about it, though, the more his composure began to crumble, so he settled on brief and to the point, the bare facts of what had happened and a warning not to contact her in any way. He added a request to pass his message on to anyone else who might need to know. He was too mentally exhausted at the moment to think of others Donna might know with a strong enough connection to him to unlock any traces of memory. He knew he could trust his friends to take care of that for him.

Mind cleared of that urgent task, a sense of the TARDIS' condition finally made it to the front of his awareness. Depleted from the experience of nearly being destroyed on the Crucible and having traveled to and from an alternate universe, she was in desperate need of fuel. The Rift in Cardiff was the quickest and simplest alternative for that, so he set the coordinates, despite the fact that it meant risking a run-in with Jack.

If he at least jumped a little bit into the future, though, any encounter of that sort might be a bit easier on Jack, and by extension on himself. He wished he could jump ahead on his own personal timeline or hide himself for a very, very long time in the deepest, darkest part of the TARDIS he could find, but one was impossible and the other was utterly selfish. So he set the time vector for a month into the future. He couldn't quite bring himself to run too far just yet. He felt that would somehow be disrespectful to Donna.

The ride was brief and should've been relatively smooth, but just as the TARDIS began to rematerialize, an alarm went off. Instruments showed a spike in Rift activity, but it was too late to pull back. Something impacted the TARDIS with a massive jolt. He was thrown to the grating hard enough to knock the wind out of him and lay there stunned as the TARDIS was roughly pulled to the side. There was a shriek outside but it sounded more like anger and frustration than pain, so he likely hadn't injured whatever it was, just made it very unhappy. He'd probably be a bit put out too if someone hit him with a police box.

The TARDIS quickly settled into a more stable landing and began to suck in the energy she so desperately needed. The ache in his chest subsided, the physical pain of the impact at any rate, and he pulled himself to his feet with the assistance of the console. He leaned over to gently pat the time rotor. "There now, old girl. Have as much as you want. I'll go take a look and make sure you're not bruised."

He shrugged into his now dry suit jacket, not bothering with the buttons or with his coat. In a twisted sort of way, they both represented comfort and protection he couldn't allow himself right now. He only took the jacket because it had the sonic and his glasses in it.

He cautiously opened the door in case the creature was waiting to take its anger out on him. Then again, maybe this was some kind of karmic retribution and he should let it happen. All he saw, though, was a flash of light in the darkness on the far side of the Plass.

Nevertheless, he'd better track it down in case it decided to take its frustration out on someone else. That he couldn't allow. Enough people had died and suffered because of him. He couldn't bear one more at the moment, even if it was a complete stranger. Especially if it was a complete stranger.

It was the middle of the night, so hopefully the creature wouldn't encounter any potential targets. He took out his sonic and made a quick scan, but nothing out of the ordinary was registering. He sensed something disturbing, though, and turned to see Jack and Martha sprinting across the Plass. They both slowed when they saw him, but Martha lagged behind as Jack walked steadily towards him with a sad and sympathetic expression on his face.

The Doctor winced. He wasn't sure if Jack's pity or his Wrongness pained him more. He somehow managed to keep himself from cringing when Jack gently took hold of his arm and barely managed to keep his emotions in check when Jack said softly, "It's good to see you again. I'm so sorry about Donna."

The sound of her name being spoken aloud brought back the disgust he felt with himself for how he'd violated her mind despite her desperate pleas. The memory made his stomach roil. He gave Jack a sharp nod but didn't meet his eyes. Fortunately, Jack let go of his arm, forestalling any further reaction he might have. In his emotionally turbulent state, it was all he could do to keep from violently shaking his arm to pull himself from Jack's grasp, and Jack truly didn't deserve to be treated like that.

"I know it's only been a month," Jack went on, "but she's fine so far. I've been having someone check in on her every now and then, someone she didn't know before she met you, so no chance of anything happening." His words slowed as he went, then he fell silent. The Doctor hazarded a glance and found himself under careful scrutiny from head to toe. Jack's eyes went wide in realization. "You're wearing the same clothes. It's only just happened for you, hasn't it?"

He briefly thought about denying it, forcing himself to fake cheerfulness, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He'd probably end up laughing like a lunatic if he tried. He settled for another nod, then turned his head away.

"Doctor, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to–"

He could sense Jack reaching for him again, so he took a quick step away. "No, don't worry, it's fine," he said, and he thought he sounded somewhat convincing. Didn't matter. He just needed to find out if there was any damage to the TARDIS, let her finish refueling, track down and capture the creature, and get out of here.

Jack didn't seem to be willing to let him be, though. "But where's everyone else? Rose and Jackie and your doppelganger?"

He thought about telling Jack it was none of his business, but he knew Jack wouldn't let it go so easily. He sighed and rubbed at his eyes in exhaustion. He hadn't given Rose a choice any more than he had Donna. So many decisions he'd taken away from others. He said curtly, "Where they should be, which is to say not with me."

He had a wild hope that would be enough for Jack, but he knew it wouldn't. Jack didn't say anything right away, so the Doctor looked at him, wondering if a miracle had occurred and Jack Harkness was satisfied with a vague answer. No such luck. It looked like Jack was simply trying to figure some way of wording his question carefully so as not to upset him. The concern had the exact opposite effect, though – it irritated him immensely. He didn't need – or deserve – to be handled with that kind of care.

Finally, Jack said, "Look, I know you don't like talking about what's over and done…" The Doctor snorted, but it apparently didn't matter what he did or didn't like talking about. "But I know Rose too and I care about her and what happens to her. Where is she? I mean, I assume you took her mother back to the alternate universe, but I thought Rose would stay with you. Is she…?" Jack swallowed, apparently unwilling to say the word, which the Doctor thought was ridiculous considering Jack bounced in and out of death on a regular basis.

"No, she's not dead. She's fine." The utter relief on Jack's face made him see that maybe he was being a bit of a bastard. It hadn't really occurred to him that Jack might think Rose was dead, and it was unkind to believe that because Jack himself was so well-acquainted with death, he would be cavalier about it when it came to others. "As I said – she's where she should be." She was. Truly. The way she'd so ardently kissed his double on that beach was the proof. He couldn't question it, couldn't allow himself to doubt.

Of course, Jack wouldn't be put off by being given the same answer twice. "What, did she run off with your better half?" He knew Jack was trying for a bit of humor, hoping to take the edges off the rawness of the topic, but it absolutely wrenched his guts to hear it stated that way.

"Something like that," he said roughly. "I left them back in the alternate universe. Rose's family is there, and he can give her everything I never could, everything she wants. Now if you're done asking questions I really don't want to answer..."

That had better satisfy Jack. It was more than enough. Any more would just be idle curiosity, and he wasn't about to indulge that. He turned his attention to inspecting the TARDIS for damage from the collision, starting with the doors and doorframe.

"Looking for your spare key?" he heard Martha ask. He'd noticed her standing back warily up to this point and realized he hadn't even given her a proper greeting. He really was being a bastard.

He gave her a grin, only a little bit forced, then folded her up in a warm hug. "Martha. It's always good to see you. But what are you doing here? Did Jack finally poach you from UNIT?"

"No." She shook her head and laughed a little. "But not for lack of trying. I'm just visiting."

"In the middle of the night?" He winced as soon as he said it. With Jack in the equation, there was surely an unintended implication there.

She didn't seem to notice, though. "We both tend to keep odd hours. Aliens aren't always courteous of human sleep patterns when they decide to cause mischief."

"True enough," he replied, then turned back to the TARDIS. He took another look at her front side but didn't see anything that hadn't been there before. "I hit something when I dematerialized. I think it came through the Rift at the same time."

"You ran into something?" Jack asked as he joined the Doctor in his inspection, going around to the left while the Doctor went right.

"Yes, or it ran into me. Doesn't much matter. There was a collision, and the sound the thing made indicated it was just a bit angry about it."

"Oh, so that's what that noise was," Martha said. "Jack and I were out getting some fresh air, and that's what brought us running."

"I don't think it was injured…" The Doctor trailed off as he reached the rear corner of the TARDIS and found blackened and still smoking claw marks gouging deep furrows right through the edge. "But it looks like it tore into the TARDIS. Apparently it had claws."

Jack and Martha both came around to have a look at what he'd found. Jack gave a quick whistle. "Wow, that's impressive," he said, reaching out tentatively to touch the gouges.

The Doctor slapped his hand away and said impatiently, "Must you touch everything, Jack?" He took out his glasses and put them on to get a better look but didn't see any detail that gave him any further hint as to what the creature was. He wanted to know what he was dealing with before he tried to hunt it down, and not just for his own safety. He knew Jack and Martha would insist on coming along.

He took his glasses off again and slid them back into his pocket as he looked up and around the Plass. "I don't suppose you've got access to those cameras?"

"Of course I do," Jack said as if it were a daft question, and it probably was. Then he added, "I like to watch everything too."

The Doctor ignored the obvious double entendre. He had no interest in bantering with anyone at the moment. "Then let's go have a look and see what did this."

Jack led them across the Plass, presumably to the entrance of Torchwood, but he stopped short of the building they'd been headed towards and instead stepped onto a large square of pavement. Martha joined him, and they both looked at the Doctor expectantly. He stopped for a moment. There was something familiar about that spot, and he was getting odd tingles down his spine. Then he remembered he'd landed the TARDIS there once.

Still a bit confused, he joined Martha and Jack, then jumped a bit as the square began to slowly move downwards. "Ah!" he said, finally understanding. "Secret entrance. I see you made use of the perception filtering effect the TARDIS left."

"Yup," was all Jack said, but the Doctor could tell he was pleased with his own cleverness.

As the lift lowered, his gaze ranged around the various levels of the cavernous room they were entering. "Interesting place you've got here," he commented. But something smelled strange. He sniffed at the air and identified the odd odor. It was one he hadn't encountered since…well, since Rose, when she'd told him she planned on staying with him forever. Nothing but impossible promises. "Pterodactyl? That's a bit risky, isn't it?"

"Nah," Jack answered and smiled. "He's friendly enough as long as you don't make the mistake of eating a steak dinner in front of him. He's got terrible table manners."

The Doctor didn't respond to that. He really wished Jack would quit trying to be humorous. He wasn't finding anything even vaguely amusing at the moment. He just wanted to take care of the creature he'd collided with and get out of here as quickly as possible. He was beginning to realize he hadn't run far enough.

They reached the bottom and stepped off the platform without any further comment from anyone. The Doctor walked forward into the main part of the room, his eyes ranging over the expected collection of work stations and computer monitors. There were a few other objects mixed in that might've interested him at another time, but no other people.

"Where are Gwen and Ianto?" he asked. "I was hoping to meet them in person." He found that he actually was, which surprised him a bit. At least he hadn't ruined _their_ lives yet.

Jack took a seat at one of the work stations and began tapping at the keyboard. "I try to let them keep regular hours as much as possible, Gwen especially since she's got Rhys to go home to. And the aliens were being quiet tonight until you showed up." He stared intently at one of the screens. "This might take a few minutes. The servers crashed yesterday, and they're still being a bit touchy. Feel free to talk among yourselves." He waved a hand at them.

The Doctor snorted. Probably Jack didn't want them to watch him fumble with the system. Despite his facility with mechanics, he didn't think Jack was much of a computer expert.

He looked over at Martha; she looked back at him expectantly. He guessed small talk was what was supposed to happen. He hated small talk. "So, how's Tom?" he asked. "I've been expecting a wedding invitation."

The look on Martha's face told him he'd stumbled into something that decidedly wasn't small talk. The smile disappeared from her face, and she looked down at the floor. "Tom and I broke it off," she said quietly, then she looked back up at him with a fierceness in her eyes. He could tell he'd inadvertently broken open a storehouse of pain and thought about telling her she didn't have to say anything more, but that was his way of dealing with painful subjects, not hers. He stood still and waited.

"No, _I_ broke it off," she said with bitterness in her voice. "He never would've left me. He's faithful to a fault, never thinks of himself, but it was too much for him, my life, my work. I didn't realize exactly how much it was affecting him until last month, after the Daleks and the Earth being stolen." She took a deep breath, shook her head. "He's not the same Tom I first met. I should've realized that. This Tom doesn't remember the Year. He has a whole different outlook, different priorities. Normal priorities. Helping people keep their children well, relaxing when he's not working, enjoying a good meal and a bit of wine every now and then. Not chasing aliens, trying to save the whole damn world and everyone in it, certainly not threatening to blow the entire planet to bits. He can still have a normal life." She paused to catch her breath, then tears sprang to her eyes and her tone softened. "He deserves to have a normal life."

Her anger struck him hard. He wasn't quite sure if it was meant to be directed at Tom or at herself. Probably both, along with the Toclafane, the Master, Davros, the Daleks, the Family – a whole host of creatures that had left their bloody fingerprints on her. Himself included. Her sorrow pained him even more. "You deserve to have a normal life too, Martha," he said quietly. If she'd never met him, she'd be living that normal life. Davros' words echoed through his mind. She was one of his Children of Time now, remade as a soldier, a weapon.

"Like John Smith and Joan Redfern?" she asked, irony tingeing her voice.

He flinched. That was the last thing he was expecting her to bring up now. He didn't think she was being malicious, though. Her eyes were soft and sad, regretful, as if she felt a bit sorry for him. "That's not the same thing," he said tersely.

"Isn't it?" she asked, tilting her head to the side and looking at him intently. "Some things just aren't meant to be. They aren't what you thought they were or what they might've been."

Guilt stabbed at him, mixed with remorse. "Oh, Martha. I'm so sorry." It was all he could think to say.

He expected her to wave him off and say it was fine, or perhaps even vent some justified anger at him, but instead she looked at him curiously. "You always say that."

He blinked. He hadn't really thought about it before. He didn't exactly toss those words around carelessly. "But I mean it every time I say it." And he did. He really and truly did. He meant it now. He very much meant it now.

"I know," she replied quietly and looked down at the floor again, just for a moment, before she turned to Jack with a forced smile on her face. Jack was no longer typing, his chair still facing the computer but his head turned slightly to the side. He was apparently waiting on them and trying not to intrude on the conversation. Martha said tightly, "All right, we're done blogging now, Jack. What have you found?"

Jack tapped a few keys, and the footage he'd pulled up on the screen started to play. The Doctor stood a couple of paces back with his arms across his chest. He could see well enough from there, and he didn't want to get that close to Jack. Stinging as he was from the rebukes he'd felt swarming through Martha's tirade, whether she intended them or not, he didn't need anything else to set him on edge.

The clip started with a shot of the empty Plass, then the TARDIS began to materialize. She hadn't quite fully solidified when there was a flash of bright, white light that slammed into the TARDIS, knocking it to the side. The light flared brighter, then appendages ending in long claws coalesced out of the main body and raked across the corner of the TARDIS. The claws melted back into the glob of light, then it contracted into a ball and shot off across the Plass.

"Ah!" the Doctor said, relieved it wasn't something worse. "I haven't seen one of those in a long time, since I was visiting the tsar of Russia." He let his mind wander through the memory for a moment. It had been a time when everything was so much simpler, before the Time War. "There was an incredible storm, and a ball of light burst in through the window of the church we were in. It spun around inside, then went out through the door. They called it ball lightning but it was definitely alive. Galvanoids, they're called. They feed on electrical sources. The one in Russia probably got overloaded from all the lightning outside and was looking for shelter from the storm, poor thing."

"Poor thing?" Jack asked incredulously. "Are we talking about the same kind of creature here – you know, the alien with claws that gouged your TARDIS?"

"Under normal circumstances, they're mostly harmless," he said evenly, still adrift in the memory. "The claws are only a defense mechanism." He took a deep breath and brought himself back to the present. "But we should still track it down. It's frightened and might hurt someone if it feels cornered. At the very least, it'll play havoc with any large sources of electricity it comes into…" He trailed off as the lights and computer monitors began to flicker, then went out entirely. "… contact with," he finished, his eyes adjusting instantly to the darkness, but then emergency generators kicked in, providing a low level of lighting.

He looked quickly around at the bits and pieces of technology scattered on desks and tables, then started to rummage about without bothering to ask permission. He didn't think Jack would mind. He didn't care if Jack did. Now that they knew what they were dealing with, he was even more determined to capture it and leave as quickly as possible. Rose, Donna, now Martha, their lives upended and scattered and broken, all because of him. He should've gone somewhere else for the TARDIS to refuel. Somewhere far, far away.

"There we go!" he said as he picked up a metallic cube. "This should do."

Jack looked at the object and frowned. "Do for what? We don't know what that thing is other than a metal cube."

"And you've just left it lying about on a desk?" the Doctor snapped. Stupid, careless, reckless… He wanted to grab Jack and shake him until his teeth rattled. "It could be a bomb for all you know."

Jack looked like he was about to make an angry retort, but Martha cut in. "_Is_ it a bomb?" she asked in a neutral tone of voice.

"Well… No, it's not," the Doctor answered, a bit deflated. He'd been gearing up to have an argument with Jack, but now he realized he was just looking for a target to tear into with his more turbulent emotions, which were many and varied and running hot and cold. He forced his breathing to slow, tossed the cube gently from hand to hand, calming himself with the repetitive motion. If he let himself go on like this, he was going to do something stupid and someone was going to get hurt. "But it easily could've been."

"So what is it then?" Martha asked, still being the calm and sensible one.

He sighed, started to explain, then stopped. "I'll show you. Much better to show than tell." Truthfully, he didn't feel much like explaining anything at the moment. "Where's the nearest power station? That's its mostly likely next target. Flies to honey, that's what that'll be."


	2. and letting go

Chapter 2 "…and letting go"

As Jack turned the SUV out of the parking garage and onto the road, he flipped open his mobile and called Gwen to explain the situation to her. After a quick hello, he told her the Doctor had dropped by at the same time as a galvanoid popped in through the Rift. "It's sort of a blobby…electricity-eating…thing. He doesn't think there'll be much of a problem capturing it, but I'd like you to stand by just in case." He thought the Doctor might be annoyed by the precaution, but when Jack glanced into the rearview mirror, he was staring out the window with his arms crossed over his chest.

Gwen acknowledged the request, and Jack snapped his phone shut. He looked into the rearview mirror again, then glanced at Martha. She was turning back from peering over her shoulder, and worry was etched into her face. He shook his head at her. There was nothing constructive they could sort out in the SUV in such a short span of time, not with the Doctor as edgy as he was. Probably nothing they could address at all. The Doctor didn't deal with his pain, he just incorporated it into himself and went on.

It wasn't far to the nearest electrical substation, and it was evident they'd picked the right place before they got there. They could see sparks shooting up into the sky in scattered bursts. He slowly pulled the SUV into the gravel next to the fence encircling the transformers. The galvanoid was wrapped around one of them, glowing brighter and expanding a bit with each spray of sparks.

They got out of the SUV, quietly closed the doors and gathered in a group. Jack's eyes were fixed on the galvanoid. He flinched at a particularly loud discharge of electricity. "So what are the chances it's going to feel the need to defend itself?" he asked. Judging from the damage it had caused the TARDIS, he was certain he didn't want to end up on the receiving end of its claws. It was bound to be extremely painful, regardless of whether or not it killed him.

"I don't plan on upsetting it that much," the Doctor replied calmly. His eyes were alert and filled with curiosity, which was a decided improvement over the barely controlled anger and grief that had been simmering just below the surface up to this point. He began to walk slowly towards the gate, pulled out his sonic screwdriver and opened the lock. Then he put the sonic away and took the cube out of his pocket as he cautiously approached the galvanoid.

Jack and Martha followed a short distance behind. His fingers were itching to draw his gun, but that was unlikely to have any effect on the creature, apart from agitating it if it recognized the gun was a weapon.

The Doctor held one hand out towards the galvanoid, fingers spread in a placating gesture, while his other hand was upturned with the cube cradled loosely inside his curled fingers. He made a crooning noise that sounded like a cat purring. The creature expanded a bit and the transformer stopped sparking. Apparently the Doctor had gotten its attention.

"Hey there," he said softly. "It's okay. I don't mean to harm you. I want to help. You're a long way from home, aren't you? I can help you get back there." He slowly opened the hand holding the cube, and its silver surface began to glow with a soft blue light. "I didn't mean to run into you earlier. That was an accident."

It was apparently the wrong thing to say. The galvanoid squeezed itself tightly around the transformer, setting off a huge shower of sparks. A long, blazing appendage shot out and connected with the Doctor's chest. He staggered under the impact and yelped in pain, but the tentacle quickly snapped back into the main mass of the creature.

Heart pounding, Jack pulled out his mobile, finger poised to hit the speed dial for Gwen. Martha had started moving towards the Doctor as soon as he had cried out, but now she stopped and stepped carefully to the side where she could keep her eye on him as well as the galvanoid.

The Doctor was rubbing at the spot on his chest where the creature had connected with him. His other hand was now clenched tightly around the cube, its light shining red through the flesh of his fingers. "Didn't find me very appetizing, did you?" he said in a quiet, controlled voice. "I was going to say I was sorry for hitting you, but you had to go and be nasty about it."

Another tentacle whipped out, but the Doctor dodged it this time, leaving it to crack through empty air before it retracted.

Jack hit the speed dial. Gwen picked up on the first ring. He didn't wait for her to say anything, just said sharply, "I need you. Bring Ianto too." He gave her the location and was about to close the mobile when something slammed into his chest with incredible force. Electricity shot through him, making every muscle in his body spasm painfully. His last thought before everything went dark was that he really hated being electrocuted.

* * *

Martha watched in agony as the galvanoid poured electricity into Jack. She couldn't do anything to help him and would probably get herself killed if she tried. She had a feeling he'd be very annoyed with her for that.

She wasn't sure why it had suddenly decided to target him, unless it understood that he was calling in reinforcements and wanted to stop him. Or maybe having failed in its attack on the Doctor, it was looking for another victim, and Jack had drawn its attention by speaking. Didn't matter what its motivations were. Obviously there was going to be no reasoning with it.

The attack was relatively brief, lasting maybe all of fifteen seconds before the galvanoid disengaged and Jack slumped to the ground. She let out a breath of relief. She wasn't sure how much longer she could've watched before her body did something her mind was screaming at it not to do.

The galvanoid turned its attention back to the Doctor. He had redoubled his efforts to convince it to come along of its own accord, telling it there was no need to be angry and all he wanted to do was help. She shook her head. Sometimes his unwillingness to give in maddened her. She could tell he was quickly losing what little patience he had, though.

There certainly wasn't anything she could do to help persuade an angry blob of electricity to calm down, especially when it had shown itself willing and able to kill, so she ran to Jack and knelt down at his side. There was a hole scorched in the middle of his shirt, and she coughed and gagged at the smell of burnt flesh. Didn't matter how many times she'd been exposed to that particular stench; it still made her retch.

She was turning to see if the Doctor was making any progress when a blast of heat blew past her ear and small jolts of electricity went skittering through her body. With Jack dead and the Doctor apparently unpalatable, the creature seemed to have decided to lash out at the only possible target left to it.

She heard the Doctor screaming her name and turned towards him, blinking hard and rubbing at her deafened ear. "I'm fine," she shouted to him, and the Doctor's expression shifted from horrified to furious. He gripped the cube tightly with both hands, gave it a sharp twist and set it on the ground. Apparently he'd reached his negotiating breaking point.

Martha could feel a low-pitched hum vibrating through the ground as part of the galvanoid was pulled from its body and stretched out until it reached the cube. Light went pulsing along the thick strand, and the creature started to slowly shrink. It was being pulled into the cube. And was decidedly not happy about it.

She cringed as she saw a tentacle of light rippling towards her, but the Doctor threw himself between her and the galvanoid. His body convulsed, his head snapped back, and his arms were flung out to the sides and forced backwards, the point of contact between him and the creature the only thing keeping him on his feet. He yelled in pain, but this time the galvanoid didn't let go, despite being pulled into the cube.

Another tentacle shot out and wrapped around the Doctor. She realized with a sickening feeling of horror that the creature was using the Doctor as an anchor as it fought against the force being exerted on it by the cube.

She was frozen to the spot. She didn't know what to do but watch and hope that either the Doctor would be able to fight back or the cube would finish pulling the galvanoid in before the Doctor was seriously injured. One of those had better happen quickly. The Doctor was being violently shaken now and was howling in pain as electricity arced up and down his body.

Thankfully, the cube's power level seemed to have increased, maybe fed by the galvanoid's own energy. The creature was being pulled in more quickly now, its body of throbbing light reduced to a thick cord spanning from the cube to the Doctor, splitting into two lines there, one still around the Doctor and the other stuck fast to his chest. The tentacle on his chest finally snapped free, but a set of long claws erupted out of it and raked downwards. The Doctor screamed in agony, his voice trailing off to a horrible series of gasping, choking sounds.

The clawed arm was quickly dragged into the cube. The cord still wrapped around the Doctor finally let go and whipped around, spinning his now limp body and throwing it to the ground with a dull thud and a nasty cracking sound. The last of the light flailed through the air and into the cube, which flared bright blue before fading back to dull silver.

Martha stayed kneeling on the ground, panting and with her heart pounding from a head-spinning rush of adrenalin. The sudden quiet was broken only by the hum of electricity and the snap of a few stray sparks from the transformer the galvanoid had been wrapped around. Jack was still dead and the Doctor… She dragged in a deep and ragged breath, then staggered to her feet, stumbled over to him and dropped to her knees by his body.

She felt for his pulses at his neck and breathed a sigh of relief when she felt the thrum of both hearts, beating rapidly, and saw his chest rising and falling, lungs pulling air through his parted lips. There were no signs of the galvanoid's attack visible on his jacket, but it probably had been pulled wide open due to his shoulders being pushed back so far, offering his chest up to the slashing claws.

She gently pulled the edges of the jacket apart, revealing blood soaking the right shoulder of his shirt and trailing off along four clean slices running diagonally down more than halfway across his chest. Blood was welling up from his shoulder, turning that part of his shirt into a sodden mess. She yanked one side of the jacket back over his body and pressed down as hard as she could on his shoulder, and along his chest as far as her hands would reach. She felt the blood soaking up through the material beneath her hands, but at least she hadn't found him with an artery slashed and half his blood already poured into the ground. This she could handle.

Her eyes ran up and down his body as she waited for the bleeding to stop. She didn't see any other obvious injuries at first, but then she noticed a large rock with a spatter of blood on it to the left of his head. She leant over and found a corresponding wound behind his ear, blood seeping out of it and running slowly down along his hairline to drip into the dirt. That explained why he was unconscious. He probably had a concussion.

She threw a quick glance towards Jack and muttered, "Come on Jack, wake up." She could use his assistance right now. At least he could get the medical kit from the SUV for her. She didn't dare lift her hands yet. She supposed it was possible Time Lord blood clotted faster than human blood, but she wasn't taking any chances.

She finally decided sufficient time had passed and carefully pulled the jacket aside again. The bleeding seemed to be under control. She quickly undid what was left of the Doctor's tie and unbuttoned the tatters of his shirt, then carefully peeled the shreds of bloody fabric away from his skin. When she saw the full extent of the wounds, she sucked in a sharp breath.

The claws had bitten deeply into his shoulder. She could see his collarbone through the lacerations and deep score marks on the bone. The bone must've snagged the claws, saving him from more serious injury. The remainder of the wounds weren't as deep, slicing shallowly across his chest, but the shoulder was more than bad enough by itself.

Since he wasn't in danger of bleeding to death any longer, if he even had been in the first place – she had no idea how much blood loss that would take for him – she went around to the other side of his body to check the head wound. At least it had stopped bleeding on its own. Remembering the cracking sound when he'd been thrown to the ground, she carefully felt around the injury with her fingers and detected some swelling, but nothing to indicate a fracture.

She pulled out the small torch she always kept in her pocket, flicked it on, and lifted his eyelids. The pupil response was marginally sluggish, almost too slight to notice, but she couldn't draw any conclusions from that based on human standards.

"How is he?"

Martha jerked back, startled half to death. She pressed a hand to her chest, feeling her heart hammering, then looked up at Jack and said crossly, "How many times have I told you not to sneak up on me when you're supposed to be dead?" She'd been so intent on examining the Doctor, she hadn't heard either the gasp that usually heralded Jack's return to the land of the living or the sound of his approach.

"Apparently not enough," he said apologetically. He crouched down next to her and took a peek at the Doctor's chest. "Ouch. I take it the galvanoid found its claws?" She thought Jack looked a bit queasy, but that might just be an aftereffect of returning from the dead.

She nodded, still trying to catch her breath. "It also gave him quite a shaking and threw him down hard. His head hit that rock." Jack glanced at the rock and winced. "He might have a concussion, hopefully not serious. Would you mind getting the medical kit out of the SUV?"

He nodded, but as he rose to his feet another SUV pulled up, tires spinning in the gravel. Gwen and Ianto got out and started jogging over as Jack went to meet them. "That was fast," he said.

"I rang Ianto after your first call and we headed over," Gwen answered. "Alien hunting and you usually means trouble."

Martha tuned out the rest of the conversation and instead started more thoroughly checking over the rest of the Doctor's body for further injuries. There didn't seem to be any scorch marks on him as there had been with Jack, so the Doctor's body must be better adapted to handling large surges of electricity. Made sense considering he hadn't been singed in the slightest after being struck by lightning at the top of the Empire State Building.

"He looks different in person." It was Ianto this time, but at least she'd heard his footsteps. Her heart rate had only just settled back to normal after the jolt Jack had given her. As he handed her the med kit, he added, "Although that might be because the last time I saw him, he was conscious and standing upright."

As she opened the med kit, Martha glanced quickly up at Ianto and saw he was looking at the chest wounds with a morbid kind of fascination. "Will he be all right?" he asked with concern.

"Yes, he should be fine. He heals very quickly." _Usually_, she added to herself. She'd seen his healing mechanisms short-circuited enough times to know it wasn't always a given.

"That's good," Ianto said, then laid a hand on her shoulder. "Are you all right?"

She put her hand on top of his and smiled. "Yes, I'm fine, thanks to him." She nodded back down at the Doctor and shivered a bit at the mental image of him bound tightly with light and electricity streaming through him. And the screams. It was like the _Pentallian_ all over again. She still had nightmares about that. She'd seen far more horrible things since then, but she'd only known the Doctor a little while at the time and hadn't quite realized what she might be facing. The experience had impressed itself deeply into her psyche.

She started sorting through the contents of the med kit, but her attention was pulled back to the Doctor as he groaned deep in his throat. He was trying to sit up before he even opened his eyes, so she gently pushed him back to the ground. "Just lie still. The galvanoid clawed you. The wounds are very deep on your shoulder."

He blinked rapidly several times, then opened his eyes wide, wincing a bit as he tried to move his shoulder. "Thanks, I noticed that. Shouldn't take long to heal. Won't even leave a mark."

That was a relief to hear. "Should I put a dressing on it in the meantime?"

"No, that's not necessary." He reached across to probe the wound with his fingertips and flinched. "Hmm, that's a bit worse than I thought. It probably should be covered up with something, the shoulder at least." His fingers searched a little further and found the shreds of his shirt. "That's another shirt in the bin," he muttered to himself, then said to her, "If there's a clean bit still left intact, go ahead and rip that off. It'll do."

"I do have medical supplies, you know."

He lifted his head slightly, then squeezed his eyes shut and put his head back on the ground. "So I see. That's good. Just the shoulder, that'll take the longest to heal. No antiseptic, though. My immune system can take care of anything that might cause an infection."

She nodded, grabbed a pair of latex gloves out of habit, then dropped them back into the med kit. Anything on her skin apparently wasn't going to affect him, and she already had his blood all over her hands. She pulled out a large sterile dressing and unwrapped it, but as she applied it to his shoulder, she noticed he was frowning. She was about to ask him what was wrong – maybe she'd missed something – when he muttered to himself, "Why does my head hurt?" He slid his hand behind his ear and pulled it back with blood smeared down his fingers. "Is that a scalp wound? Oh, I hate those. They always scar."

"Good thing you've got enough hair to cover it up, then," she said but didn't smile. "Should I put a dressing on that as well?" She was beginning to feel like a first year medical student asking him all these basic questions, but she felt like she could never assume anything when it came to him. She'd err on the side of caution if she had to, but since he was awake and giving input, she'd follow his lead.

"No, it'll be fine." He hauled himself up to sitting before she could stop him, then started to fall backwards again. She tried to catch him but wasn't in a good position to do so. Fortunately, Gwen had been walking towards them and managed to dive down to the ground and shove her hands under his shoulders quickly enough to save him from knocking his head against the ground.

"You've probably got a bit of a concussion," Martha said in irritation, "which you might've figured out from the lump on your head if you'd stopped to think about it. Just lie there for a minute, give your equilibrium a chance to settle." He started to say something, probably to deny anything being wrong with his balance, despite the evidence to the contrary, but she cut him off. "Don't make me sit on you because I will if I have to." He glared at her, but didn't say anything and actually held still.

To give herself an excuse not to have a staring contest with him, because she knew she'd lose, she tore the wrapping off a piece of gauze, then tilted her head and leaned to the side so she could see behind his ear. She started to wipe the blood from his head and neck, but he tried to turn towards her, saying, "Martha, I told you that doesn't need–"

She put her hand against his temple and pushed his head back in the other direction. "I heard you, but I'm at least going to clean this up a bit so you won't be walking about with blood dripping down your neck like a vampire's had at you."

She knew it was ridiculous to worry about the little bit of blood from the head wound considering the condition of his shirt and jacket, but it gave her something simple to do to calm herself. She was rattled that he'd been hurt at all and that Jack had been killed doing something that should've been quick and easy. But it seemed nothing in her life these days was simple, and she'd just about stopped hoping that next time it would be.

She gave the wound a last careful swipe, then said gently, "You might want to try sitting up a bit more slowly. Would you help him, Gwen?"

Gwen nodded, shifted from above the Doctor's head to the side across from Martha, and slid an arm behind his back. As she helped pull him back up to a sitting position, he blinked at her and smiled. "Gwen Cooper! Lovely to finally meet you in person." He stared hard at her for a moment, long enough for Gwen to give Martha a concerned look, but then he said, "There. Just one of you now. Thought I was getting a cross-temporal echo there for a moment."

Martha was about to insist on checking his pupil response again when Jack called over to them. "Anything we should know about this cube thing before we pick it up?"

"No. It's perfectly safe now," the Doctor replied as he struggled to his feet with Gwen's assistance. Martha remained on the ground, shaking her head. No use ever thinking about the Doctor as a patient. Or patient, for that matter. Unless he was somehow incapacitated, he'd be up and about as soon as he was even marginally able. She'd only ever gotten him to sit still for a reasonable amount of time on the _Pentallian_, and that was probably because he was humoring the new companion.

"There might be enough residual electricity to make your hair stand on end," the Doctor said, then paused. "But I see you've found that out already."

Martha glanced over to where Ianto was standing with the cube in his hand, his hair lifting upwards from his scalp. His hand went to his head, and his expression was decidedly chagrined as he attempted to flatten the hair back to where it belonged, to no avail.

The Doctor walked slowly over to Ianto – with a bit of a stagger, Martha was annoyed to note as she stood up herself. "Good to meet you as well, Ianto Jones. I'd shake your hand, but my hand-shaking arm seems to be a bit useless at the moment."

"Understandable," Ianto said dryly.

The Doctor reached over with his left hand and plucked the cube from Ianto's grasp. "I'll just be taking that, if you don't mind." He slid the cube quickly into his outside pocket, gave it a pat, then painfully pulled the edges of his jacket together as he turned to Jack. "Now, if you'll be so kind as to give me a ride back to the TARDIS, I'll be off to take this lovely little creature back to its home."

Martha noticed Jack eying the Doctor seriously for a moment, as if trying to assess whether or not he was fit to be allowed to leave. Bless him for that, but it wasn't likely the Doctor would pay any more attention to him than to her.

Jack finally pointed at the Doctor's pocket and said very sternly, "I want that cube back when you're done with it."

The Doctor started to shrug but then thought better of it. He grimaced and reached his hand across his body to hold his injured arm still. "Oh, I might not be able to get back here for a while, and you know how I am, forever losing things. If you let me back in the Hub, I might be tempted to lose a few more things. You really need to be careful with what you've got laying around in there."

Jacked glared at him but didn't respond to the criticism. Instead he gestured towards the SUV and said flatly, "After you."

Gwen and Ianto said their brief goodbyes and set off in the other SUV, while Jack drove Martha and the Doctor back to the TARDIS. No one spoke during the ride. Jack was stony in his silence, eyes fixed on the road ahead. Martha imagined he was still smarting from the Doctor's rebuke about how Torchwood was handling the alien objects it had found.

The Doctor brooded all the way, his face frozen in an expression that was a mixture of sadness and anger. She'd never seen him in such a dark mood for this long. Usually, he shrugged it off as soon as he realized someone had noticed. Now, he didn't seem to care.

She felt a wave of sorrow and regret wash through her. The Doctor had already lost so much, and now Rose and Donna too. It made her losing Tom seem all that much more insignificant, and now she felt a bit guilty for lashing out as she had in the Hub.

She didn't really fault the Doctor for any of it. She'd probably never have met Tom if she hadn't met the Doctor first, so she was fated to meet Tom as the person she'd become because of the Year. Ultimately, it was a doomed relationship. Or maybe she just wanted to believe that. Maybe she was running away. She'd spent so much of the Year fleeing from death, and Tom was so strongly connected to memories of that time. Maybe she was still trying to escape. She wasn't certain she could ever get over that urge.

She realized it was possible the same desire to run away from the Year was part of what had led her to leave the Doctor, despite telling herself and him that it was because he never saw her, was oblivious to her feelings for him. Maybe she'd just used that as an excuse because it was easier, a lesser accusation.

God, but she'd been an idiot. Naïve as she was when she'd first gone traveling with him, she'd assumed he was sweeping her up in the most extravagant, unbelievable first date ever. It was probably the worst misjudgment she'd ever made about someone else's intentions. She'd thought she'd known how to read people, but the Doctor had been a huge eye-opener in that regard.

She still cared about him very deeply, probably even more now that she'd stopped looking at him as dating material and now saw him only as a friend. She was very concerned about his leaving by himself. She knew, or she thought she knew, that he'd manage just fine on his own, but it still pained her to think of him going on alone.

Jack parked the SUV near the Plass, and he and Martha walked the Doctor over to the TARDIS, still without any of them speaking. Although that certainly did nothing to reassure her about the Doctor's state of mind, at least he was walking steadily now and was no longer wincing every time he moved his arm. He'd buttoned his suit jacket over the remains of his bloodied shirt when they'd gotten out of the SUV, so probably as far as he was concerned, that was over and done with, disposal of the ruined shirt and tie and cleaning of the blood-stained jacket aside.

Jack peered around the side of the TARDIS and said, "The claw marks are just about gone."

"That's good," the Doctor said softly as he stared absently towards the top of the TARDIS, his shoulders slumped. Then he straightened himself and turned to face Jack. "I'll just forgo the good-bye hug, if you don't mind. Shoulder still hurts."

Jack looked at the Doctor consideringly. "Are you sure you'll be all right?"

"I'm fine," was the predictable reply. Martha wondered why Jack even bothered asking. Maybe he was hoping one day he'd get an honest answer. Then again, as long as he was going to be alive, she supposed it was possible one day he might.

Jack nodded, accepting the answer for now. He gave a little salute, but the Doctor didn't return it as he had when he'd dropped them off after the Crucible. Jack didn't seem to be expecting a response. As he turned to head back to the Hub, he gave her a quick nod, telling her with his eyes that he knew she'd want a moment alone with the Doctor, that he'd see her afterwards if she wanted to talk. She smiled gratefully.

When she returned her attention to the Doctor, he was already unlocking the door of the TARDIS. He stood there for a moment holding the door handle, his head bowed. The thought crossed her mind that he was going to simply say goodbye without so much as looking at her again. He wasn't moving, though. He wasn't saying anything either.

"Doctor," she said sadly, but she didn't know what else she could say to him, or do for him. Maybe it _would_ be best to just say goodbye and leave it at that.

He took a deep breath, then turned and gave her the barest ghost of a smile. "I'll be fine, Martha," he said gently. "I always am."

She almost said, "I know," but stopped herself. He was never really all right. She found herself saying instead, "I know I'm not Donna or Rose, but if you'd like a little company for a while…" She realized the offer was sincere and she would go with him if he asked, but part of her knew how painful it would be for both of them. Too much raw emotion on both sides.

"No. Thank you, Martha, but I'd like to do a bit of traveling on my own for a while."

"All right then." She tilted her head to the side and frowned at him. "You're such a lonely person." She wasn't sure why she said it. It just seemed plainly true to her and it seemed to need saying.

"Being alone isn't the same as being lonely, Martha," he said softly.

"I know." But she knew good and well he was both at the moment.

There didn't seem to be much else to say, so she smiled at him and said, "Well, try to take care of yourself."

"I will." He nodded and attempted to look at her reassuringly. At least he was making an effort.

"I'd tell you to visit more often, but I know you'll come and go when you want or need to." He looked like he was going to object but she cut him off. "It's true and you know it. You are what you are."

He sighed and nodded to concede the point, then added, "And you wouldn't have it any other way?"

"Well, that's a bit clichéd, but yeah, I guess that's my point. Just…go and be you."

"I think I can manage that at least." He gave her one last, sad smile, slid through the TARDIS's fractionally open door and closed it behind him. She watched the TARDIS dematerialize, then turned to head back to the Hub. She needed a drink, and she was sure she wouldn't have to do much persuading to get Jack to join her. She didn't think they'd talk about the Doctor or what had happened tonight; they never did. But then sometimes words weren't needed. Or the words simply weren't there at all. She was getting used to that.


End file.
